Is Jesus's "this generation will certainly not pass" valid grounds for scepticism?

[Thermal]

But surely if we had free will, we'd choose not to have this same exact conversation every year with the same exact conclusion every time.

Sometimes an arguer puts an idea together in such a way that it makes the penny drop for someone else, in a way no one had before. I've changed my mind on issues as a result of good argumentation here, that I didn't stumble across in the wild.

 

[Olmstead]

Seems a bit of a self-fulfilling premise? "If everything was identical, would it be identical?"

I'd assume the subject's mood and motivation and feelings in that moment would be the same, and he would still throw the rock, yes. The very premise of saying everything was the same leading up kind of requires that.

Okay, but surely there is nothing the person could have done to make their mood, feelings, etc. different? The situation in the preeceding minutes would have been the same, for example the testosterone having build up. The situation in the preeceding years would have been the same, both physically, like a stressful job making synapses more excitable, or emotionally, like never beeing given an aversion to vandalims or fear of consequences in their upbrigning. And they couldn't "give themselves" an aversion to vandalism, because in the period where they could have given themselves that aversion, the situation was such that it wouldn't happen. Etc., etc.

I know the discussion has been circling around this point for a bit, but there's a difference between this type of deterministic outcome, where serial killers were alway going to become serial killers, and geniuses were always going to become geniues, and the research of Libet and others, where at the most extreme end, we might not even do things consciously, but have our brains make up sensible stories afterwards.

Because the first point, I think, is incontrovertibly true. People cannot derive some sort of "will" outside the system. The will to resist urges had to have been there, either due to the type of brain one has been born with, or due to the type of experiences that shaped the brain or personality. And one cannot "will" oneself into getting that will.

If we agree on that and disregard the research on how much we do consciously at all, the discussion on free will is largely philosophical. If a consciousness shaped completely by outside forces, shaping itself only in accordance with how the outside forces have already shaped it, acts in the only way it could possible act, is there a way to call that "free will"?

 

[Thermal]

...Because the first point, I think, is incontrovertibly true. People cannot derive some sort of "will" outside the system. The will to resist urges had to have been there, either due to the type of brain one has been born with, or due to the type of experiences that shaped the brain or personality. And one cannot "will" oneself into getting that will.

Disagreed, and I think it's the crux of the argument. I think higher executive functioning override the more animal, instinctive decision making process. It is kinda what separates us from poodles. That higher executive functioning is the core of free will.

If we agree on that and disregard the research on how much we do consciously at all,

Which as skeptics we should never ever ever ever do.

the discussion on free will is largely philosophical. If a consciousness shaped completely by outside forces,

I don't think it is. I think it is largely shaped by outside forces.

shaping itself only in accordance with how the outside forces have already shaped it,

I don't think it does. I think higher functioning can choose independently, and often in contradiction to, the brain's screaming desire to choose otherwise.

acts in the only way it could possible act,

Getting a bit repetitious, but again, neither my starting assumption or conclusion.

is there a way to call that "free will"?

Yup. For starters, you pose that you as an observer could stand outside time and observe two different timelines. I find that a fruitless way of looking at it. It also assumes we know a great deal about how decisions are made. Your assumption is a direct cause-effect chain, inviolate and immutable. I have no reason to think this (except in hindsight).

 

[Olmstead]

Disagreed, and I think it's the crux of the argument. I think higher executive functioning override the more animal, instinctive decision making process. It is kinda what separates us from poodles. That higher executive functioning is the core of free will.

But that higher executive functioning is still part of the brain. A person has no control over whether that part of the brain will be strong enough, or whether it will even want to try. Even after an absolute intention has been made, a person doesn't know whether they will go through with it. A student can't have the intention to study for 8 hours, flip a switch, and then just do that. A student with the right brain and in the right environment will do that, and one without those conditions won't. There's nothing the second student can do to fix that.

Which as skeptics we should never ever ever ever do.

That wasn't really what I was going for: it muddles the waters. It's good to know exactly what the argument is. Those two things are related, but they are also separate issues.

I don't think it does. I think higher functioning can choose independently, and often in contradiction to, the brain's screaming desire to choose otherwise.

But that doesn't make any sense. The brain doesn't just have one screaming desire, it has several, contradictory and complicated. From the screaming desire to not do painful things at this very moment, to the more long-term screaming desire of not starving in the next 20 years and the arguably altruistic screaming desire of helping your children, other people, or the community. Everything the brain does is a screaming desire. It doesn't make sense to make a distinction between "animal instincts" and some sort of "higher instincts". They all come from the same place.

 

[Thermal]

But that higher executive functioning is still part of the brain. A person has no control over whether that part of the brain will be strong enough, or whether it will even want to try.

Thats your starting assumption. Its not mine.

That wasn't really what I was going for: it muddles the waters. It's good to know exactly what the argument is. Those two things are related, but they are also separate issues.

If you want to steer away from science and into beard stroking, then yes, it will muddy the waters. But many of us find thar science clears the waters more than muddy them.

If you want to keep.it purely philosophical, I've already done so. I experience free will in the same way I experience having hands. Until there is some persuasive evidence to the contrary, it suffices for me. My philosophy, after all, is quite consciously formed by science and logic, as it should be.

But that doesn't make any sense. The brain doesn't just have one screaming desire, it has several, contradictory and complicated. From the screaming desire to not do painful things at this very moment, to the more long-term screaming desire of not starving in the next 20 years and the arguably altruistic screaming desire of helping your children, other people, or the community. Everything the brain does is a screaming desire. It doesn't make sense to make a distinction between "animal instincts" and some sort of "higher instincts". They all come from the same place.

They do, and hopefully without being too flippant, there are some surprisingly divergent functions that come from my penis, while coming from the same place.

Back to philosophy: your starting assumption (that you have an impressive adherence to) is that human decision making is a cause/effect relationship, without opportunity for change. What do you base this on? If you say "well that's how everything we know works", then two points to keep in mind (that I already harped about):

1. We modify our understanding of physics whenever we get results we don't like. Might that apply here? If not, why not? The human mind is what we have the least understanding of, much more so than Dark Matter or quantum weirdness.

{Eta: when the math predicted galaxies spinning the wrong way, did we conclude that "it's just an illuuuuuuusion, man", or did we modify the rules to accommodate what we saw? Why do you think that's out-of-bounds in the case of free will and choices?}

2. You are inserting a known mechanism to an unknown process, without the most remote understanding if it applies. Why?

2.5 (bonus). Your take, by extension, assumes no randomness in the universe. Pretty sure about that?

 

[Olmstead]

Thats your starting assumption. Its not mine.

No other assumption makes sense. The brain and body can only do what they are programmed to do, and respond in the way they are programmed to respond. The model works. It's impossible to even imagine a different model. I don't know what else to say about this.

If you want to steer away from science and into beard stroking, then yes, it will muddy the waters. But many of us find thar science clears the waters more than muddy them.

I'm not steering away from science. It's both science, but studies like Libet's experiments are only concerned with a small part of the free will discourse. They don't say anything useful about how a decision has been predetermined hours, days, or even years ago by arbitrary neurons and arbitrary circumstances.

If you want to keep.it purely philosophical, I've already done so. I experience free will in the same way I experience having hands. Until there is some persuasive evidence to the contrary, it suffices for me. My philosophy, after all, is quite consciously formed by science and logic, as it should be.

Fortunately we have people without hands who very definitively experience having hands. I trust my brain implicitly is neither science nor logic.

They do, and hopefully without being too flippant, there are some surprisingly divergent functions that come from my penis, while coming from the same place.

Back to philosophy: your starting assumption (that you have an impressive adherence to) is that human decision making is a cause/effect relationship, without opportunity for change. What do you base this on? If you say "well that's how everything we know works", then two points to keep in mind (that I already harped about):

1. We modify our understanding of physics whenever we get results we don't like. Might that apply here? If not, why not? The human mind is what we have the least understanding of, much more so than Dark Matter or quantum weidness.

And when the "Einsteinian" theory of consciousness comes along, I'll happily abandon the "Newtonian" one. But like in that particular case, the current model is sound, there are no others, and it's unlikely a new model will completely refute the old one rather than complement it.

2. You are inserting a known mechanism to an unknown process, without the most remote understanding if it applies. Why?

Because it's the only mechanism that works, and "without the most remote understanding" is an exaggeration. We have a pretty good understanding, just not a perfect one. Similar to Newton. Or Einstein for that matter.

2.5 (bonus). Your take, by extension, assumes no randomness in the universe. Pretty sure about that?

I don't assume no randomness. Randomness is simply irrelevant. Randomness wouldn't make a choice free, it would simply make it random.

 

[Thermal]

And when the "Einsteinian" theory of consciousness comes along, I'll happily abandon the "Newtonian" one. But like in that particular case, the current model is sound, there are no others, and it's unlikely a new model will completely refute the old one rather than complement it.

Ok. This seems to be a major sticking point. You claim there is a physical model for consciousness. I know of no such model. Can you point me at the physical model you are relying on? You don't have to summarize; I'll go chase it down.

I don't assume no randomness. Randomness is simply irrelevant. Randomness wouldn't make a choice free, it would simply make it random.

So we can have randomness and uncertainty, but for some reason not in the process of consciousness? Why not? For the same reason you're cool with modifying physics when galaxies are spinning the wrong way, but man the barricades when it is suggested we might need to modify for free will?

Eta: regarding luckily having handless people who experience having hands: no we don't. They don't see them. They can't pick up a pencil with them. They know, with every fiber of their being, that they have no hands but experience the phantom limb effect or whatever they call it. The actual experience of knowing they have hands, as I do, is false at every level.

 

[pgwenthold]

Oh, then it's simple. I know we don't have such a system in the same way I know there is not a teapot orbiting Saturn.

We experience free will, just like we experience having hands at the end of our arms. You want to go all hippy guru and say "its all an illuuuuuuuuusion, man"? Go ahead. But until you have evidence (of which there is dead zero), it can be summarily dismiss

I'll ask the question I asked before: how do you distinguish between actual free will and apparent free will?

If you didn't have free will, how could you tell?

 

[Thermal]

I'll ask the question I asked before: how do you distinguish between actual free will and apparent free will?

If you didn't have free will, how could you tell?

And I'll answer as I have many times: in the same way I distinguish between having actual hands and apparent hands. It's a nonsensical question.

 

[acbytesla]

I have to admit I find it interesting that people will argue over this. It really is un-provable either way. So for me, I don't find it very interesting.

 

[theprestige]

Sometimes an arguer puts an idea together in such a way that it makes the penny drop for someone else, in a way no one had before. I've changed my mind on issues as a result of good argumentation here, that I didn't stumble across in the wild.

This particular topic never seems to get out its rut, here.

Peter Watts did more to change my thinking on the nature of apparent free will in humans than any of the dozens of attempts on this forum.

 

[Skeptical Greg]

This particular topic never seems to get out its rut, here.

Peter Watts did more to change my thinking on the nature of apparent free will in humans than any of the dozens of attempts on this forum.

Had to Google.. Somehow I've missed Watts in my SF endeavors. What would you recommend for a first read to get me hooked?

 

[theprestige]

Had to Google.. Somehow I've missed Watts in my SF endeavors. What would you recommend for a first read to get me hooked?

If you want something really bleak, start with Starfish. If you want a deep time procedural, Freeze Frame Revolution. If you want to completely recontextualize your concept of self awareness, Blindsight.

Personally I like Blindsight.

 

[Skeptical Greg]

Just read the sample of Blindsight ( part of it ) on Amazon, and ordered it. I'm hooked.

 

[Poem]

quoted from Poem's article linked in the Federalist.

IOW, "Intelligent Design" Behe pulled it out of his nethers.

I’ve read it all and followed the embedded links, it’s full of half-truths and mischaracterisations.

Cheers, however it doesn't exactly amount to overwhelming evidence of the "third of biologists" figure.

You are all right to be sceptical regarding the 1/3 figure and I was wrong to declare it is as fact. I would still argue, though, that there is a significant number: it might be less, but it could be more. Firstly, the Federalist article acknowledges that it is an estimate and states that:
"...the growing discontent in academia is from secular naturalists."

In my original post I linked to a number of sources - as The Federalist does. The Nature article: Does Evolutionary Theory Need A Rethink does have Kevin Laland (and colleagues) affirms that:
"The number of biologists calling for change in how evolution is conceptualized is growing rapidly. Strong support comes from allied disciplines, particularly developmental biology, but also genomics, epigenetics, ecology and social science. We contend that evolutionary biology needs revision if it is to benefit fully from these other disciplines. The data supporting our position gets stronger every day."

On this website called 'Extended Evolutionary Synthesis' there is an in depth look at the Does Evolutionary Theory Need A Rethink article. According to Laland:
"In January 2014 we submitted an earlier version of this manuscript to Nature, who sent it out to review. The editor wrote back to us in March, explaining why they were unable to publish the piece. Of the four referees’ comments, two were glowing (describing our article as “excellent” and “extremely important”) but two were very critical (using terms like “fundamentally unsound” and “wildly overblown” to depict it). This was an early indication of the highly polarized response that the concept of an extended synthesis would evoke."

"On the one hand, it probably did polarize the community, and politicize the discussions, to a degree and that is unfortunate. In the aftermath of publication, I was deluged by over a thousand emails from researchers spanning a wide array of disciplines who endorsed our position, many of them sending me publications and manuscripts that they felt strengthened our argument. I’ve had more correspondence about that one short article than all of the other (nearly 300) articles I have published in my career put together! Yet, I know that the counterpoint team received at least as much support, particularly on social media."

I also linked to 'Nature Institute' - Evolution: A Third Way where Stephen L. Talbot (who is listed on the Third Way website) states:
In recent years we’ve seen increasing numbers of biologists who are dissatisfied with conventional (“Neo-Darwinian”) evolutionary theory — biologists who, it would appear, are also unhappy with the resistance of an entrenched scientific establishment to the consideration of new ideas

Some quotes from this interview with physiologist and biologist Denis Noble:
"There is a very substantial group of us who wish to see research on evolutionary biology open up to the new trends which are very important...which are also old trends because they were found many years ago- they have been ignored."

Nobles speaks about how there is a problem expressing his view in the USA:
"There is a fear there on the part of standard evolutionary biologists that if they admit that they were wrong the religious right will be....laughing down their beards."

In this interview Noble forthrightly claims:
"The experimental facts are already clear - Neo-Darwinism is dead"

 

[Poem]

Just to remind those interested in the above: it was originally a response to it being pointed out that Christians are split over there interpretation of the Bible...so the point is that biologists don't exactly sing from the same hymn sheet either.

 

[Darat]

Just to remind those interested in the above: it was originally a response to it being pointed out that Christians are split over there interpretation of the Bible...so the point is that biologists don't exactly sing from the same hymn sheet either.

And to remind you, you are trying to draw a comparison that doesn’t work. Science is not a religion so any disagreement between scientists is not like a disagreement between Christians, a better example would be between followers of football and the disagreements between the fans of different clubs.

No that I understand why you want a comparison in the first place.

 

[Poem]

It is also worth pointing out that posters who have claimed that the use of the phrase 'Neo-Darwinism' suggests a creationists bent is clearly false.

 

[Skeptical Greg]

Being split over the musings of bronze age goat herders vs the research of modern scientists may not be the best analogy in the world.

(Acknowledging Darat beat me to it)

 

[Skeptical Greg]

...a better example would be between followers of football and the disagreements between the fans of different clubs.

Maybe Tolkien vs Rowling?